Friday Fun: Kids and the Pets Who Tolerate Them

Happy Friday!

This week, I'd like readers who feel so inclined to share their comical photos of their kids and their pets.  I think it's really important for kids to have pets because they learn responsibility and how to take care of living things.  They also get the unconditional love and snuggles family pets so willingly provide.

Best buds!

But, sometimes those poor pets don't quite know what to make of the exuberance of the little people in their households.  At times it can surely be frightening, and at times just plain weird. Still, most pets (thankfully, like ours) are incredibly loving and understanding toward these overly active, loud, enthusiastic beings.

Anna with Kelsey's cat, Artemis

Friday Fun/Photo of the Week: "Luuuuuuccccy!"

Heidi and I rarely get out.  So our recent opportunity to go to a Halloween costume party for the first time in years was exciting!

For this week's Friday entertainment, I'll share a photo of our costume efforts:

Is that Vitameatavegimin in that cup?!

Friday Fun: We've All Been There

Happy Friday!  Today I will share with you an image that has been popular on my Facebook page.  I am sure all of you parents can relate!

I don't know where this came from, but I know this is SO my life. :)

Have a great weekend, all you multitasking parents!

Friday Fun: Storytime with Anna

Happy Friday! And now, without further delay, I present a story created by my daughter. She claims this was a dream, but as she recounted it, I think she started to make it up/ imbellish as she went along.

We hope you enjoy this foray into the mind of a four year old.

You won't believe the stuff I come up with!

Friday Fun: My Little Gymnast!

Happy Friday!

Does your child leap recklessly off of furniture? Attempt somersaults in the living room?

Friday Fun: Memorable Quotes

Here's the latest from the mouth of our precious and precocious preschooler:

• Anna (as I pick her up from day care): "Can I please have a baby sister?"  Me: "Umm, no, honey, these things are really complicated."  Anna: "But I promise to take good care of it!" ...and I'm sure "it" would be fortunate. But I don't see that happening!  

Adventures in babysitting with our friend's adorable little girl!

Friday Fun: The Culinary Efforts of Mediocre Cooks

There are some of us who are amazing in the kitchen. You know, those people who can just take various ingredients, add a little of this and a dash of that, and (with no recipe), produce some delicious, restaurant-quality concoction.

I am sooo not one of them!

I can make fairly basic meals - spaghetti (with jar sauce, of course) and (frozen) meatballs, chicken fajitas, roast beef that sits in a crock pot all day and cooks itself, Indian chicken Tikka and rice (again, with jar sauce), eggs and (microwaveable) bacon.....you get my drift.

If it's easy, there is a recipe, and many if not all of the ingredients are prepackaged, I'm all over it. And thankfully, Anna is too young to realize I'm not really talented in the culinary arts.

Friday Fun: That Witch Is Wise

Happy Friday, all! For this week's end-of-week amusement, I will share this hilarious picture I saw on Facebook last week, which speaks for itself.

Not only do I love The Wizard of Oz, but you just can't argue with Glenda the Good Witch. Have an amazing weekend, everybody!

Friday Fun: The Alien Crab Invasion

Happy Friday! Hope you enjoy this latest foray into the amazing place that is the preschooler imagination.

Anna:    I had a dream about a crab.
Me:    What happened in your dream?
Anna:    The crab was taken away from its mom and dad.
Me:    Who took it? [This is the part where I expected to hear "seagulls".]
Anna:   Aliens. They took it in their spaceship because they wanted a curtain.

??? (from showerail.co.uk)

Friday Fun: The Secret Life of Dolls

Anna is in the throes of her Disney princess phase. So, recently when we were at a friend's house for a play date, Anna's friend let her borrow Rapunzel and, in return, Anna let her borrow her talking Ord the dragon.

Our schedules have prevented us from getting together since, so the girls haven't yet had a chance to trade back their toys. So, Rapunzel has decided to settle in and keep herself entertained until it's time to go home. She retained Uncle Keith as her stylist and decided to branch out into edgy territory....imitating Lady Gaga.

Check her out! Does Gaga have some competition in the weirdness department here??

Friday Fun: Photo Shoot Bloopers!

As anyone with a young child knows, picture time is often difficult for little ones. Anna typically is a ham - she loves to pose and say "cheeeeeeese!" with a giant, toothy grin. But we had never had real family photos done until we had a photo shoot with a pro before the adoption. And boy was it.....fun.

I am NOT having my picture taken!

Friday Fun: Adventures of Crazy Felines

Happy Friday! We've (okay, I've) been slacking on our Friday Fun these past few weeks, but I've been saving this one because I love cat antics.

The back story: in order to install a dishwasher in our kitchen, we had to have some of the cabinets beneath our counter gutted. Because the cabinets were not intended for this, there remains a slight gap between the bottom of the dishwasher and the floor.

Personally, I could care less about this from an aesthetic perspective. I'm just glad we have replaced our old "dish washer" (me) with this machine that saves me lots of time and energy.

Our cat, however, finds this to be a source of continual frustration.

Friday Fun: Owl Butt!

That got your attention, I hope!

Those of you who are my Facebook friends might have already seen this, but I thought I'd share it with the rest of you and also provide the back story because I'm still amused by it.

Anna used to have nighttime pull-ups with owls on them. They had princesses too, but some had owls and moons on the butt. Every night, she would go through the stack and pick out the owl ones. When we would eventually run out and were left with princesses, she would whine and say, "I wanna be owl butt!" Unfortunately, for some reason, I can no longer find those pull-ups, so we've settled for Cinderella ones.

Friday Fun: Adventures in "Reading"!

I absolutely love it that Anna has gotten to the stage where she will attempt to "read" books to me at bedtime, or "read" them together. The other night, as I was getting ready for bed, I found Anna already relaxing and waiting for me (shocking!) and reading to herself.

Chillin' with her new book

 

Friday Fun: Little Picassos!

Happy Friday!

The other day while dropping Anna off at day care, I had the pleasure of spending some time with her little friends as well. They are such adorable kids! Anna decided she wanted to draw me a picture to bring to work, and then a little boy walked up to me and gave me a picture he had just drawn and said, "This is for you, too!" (I know the names of everyone in Anna's class but I don't publish them without talking to their parents first so we'll keep them anonymous this time.)

Anna's pic on left, 1st little boy's pic on right

Friday Fun: Going Buggy!

Now that spring really feels like it's in the air (well, sort of), Anna is eager to play more outside. I'm sure that's true for just about every kid. But besides the typical things - drawing with sidewalk chalk, going to the park, playing ball, riding bikes - what sorts of fun mischief can we get into?

Photo from crochet4aprincess.blogspot.com

I just read an article with a creative answer: make a bug jar!  This sounds like exactly the kind of thing I'd have wanted to do when I was a kid. I loved playing in the yard and seeing what I could find. I think my favorite discovery when I was Anna's age was a frog that peed in my dad's hand. I screamed but it was really funny. Some things you never forget.

I also loved trying to see lightning bugs and catch them. Just picturing it, I can almost smell the warm, summer air. It was worth the risk of mosquito bites to see those little lights illuminated against the night sky.

Anyway, I'm going to reproduce here the steps set forth in Hannah Boyd's article from Education.com, but feel free to improvise.

         *****

What You Need:

• A large jar with a lid
• A small screwdriver
• A hammer
• Leaves, twigs, grass, etc.
• A small notebook
• Colored pencils

What You Do:

1. Hold the pointed end of the screwdriver vertically against the lid of the jar, and tap the other end with the hammer to poke small holes all over the lid. Watch your thumbs!
2. Go outside with your child and find some twigs, leaves, and grass. Stock the jar with those and sprinkle a couple drops of water inside. You might also want to add in a tiny chunk of fruit.
3. Now for the nitty-gritty fun part! Help your child search your backyard for bugs. Encourage her to look under rocks and logs, on trees and bushes, and anywhere else you think you might find a little critter to capture. When she finds one, help her catch it. Add the bug to the jar and cover it with the lid. Start with just one bug.
4. Hand her the notebook and the colored pencils. Invite her to draw a picture of the bug. Then ask her what she sees going on (the bug is on the leaf) and what she infers from that (it's hungry!). Ask her to write down her observations. If she's not writing yet, take notes for her; otherwise let her wield the pen.
5. If she wants to keep observing the bug, let her do so but be sure to set the critter free by the end of the day.
6. Over the week, try to find different bugs to observe and keep notes on the observations of them all. Just be sure you release them when you're finished!

*****

Sounds fun, doesn't it? It's not rocket science, but this is why I scour the web for stuff like this - I'm too tired and overworked to come up with stuff all the time. And there are all sorts of fun things out there! So, enjoy, and feel free to let us know how the bug experiment went with your kids!